


all your love is sunlight

by yogurtgun



Series: The Vranjska Series [1]
Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: 5+1 Things, Anal Sex, Castle Black, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Fix-It, Huddling For Warmth, Languages, M/M, Oral Sex, Period-Typical Homophobia, Temporary Character Death, free folk have their own language and nobody can convince me otherwise
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-24
Updated: 2019-05-31
Packaged: 2020-03-01 06:11:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 19,147
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18794554
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yogurtgun/pseuds/yogurtgun
Summary: Jon only wants to do the right thing: save thousands from the certain grip of the Night King's cold hands. Though some of the brothers don't agree, they weren't the ones who'd spent time with the Free Folk. Now, as Lord Commander, he can even act according to his duty. Perhaps travelling to Hardhome will be difficult, but Tormund has agreed to help him.Freed and allowed to go anywhere on the ship despite the unease of Stannis’ men and the brothers of the Watch, Tormund sits next to him on bundles of rope, looking like a great bear sunbathing. When they’d first met, Jon had thought Tormund an indomitable but handsome man and not much has changed since.





	1. Jon

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is inspired by S08E01 Jon and Tormund reunion. Yes, really. After that last goodbye, and the consequent reunion at the end of the season I really wanted to post this slow burn. Picks up from Hardhome and covers the journey to Castle Black, and consequences of Jon's actions. It's a gratuitous falling in love story. The title is one of Hozier's recent songs. Though it appropriate, considering Tormund :)

The lands beyond the Wall are far from the frozen wastelands Jon had seen in his mind before he’d left Castle Black. Now, he concedes to the freezing temperatures, where the warmest skins are necessary to keep the frostbite away, he concedes to the primordial layers of snow and ice piled one onto another, which shape and reshape the landscape, and he concedes to the warmth of the sun that shines upon him, and the snow-blindness that follows. Nothing in the world is uniform and neither are the frozen lands. 

From the top of the Wall all he could see were distant mountains, a forest that hid more than it ever showed, and a stretch of barren land at their doorstep. Beyond that forest, Jon had found infinitely more.

There were canyons as deep as mountains were tal, where secret waters rushed through, bruising the rocks and ice. The rapids left harsh lesions in their wake, only to disappeared underground and reappear miles away as tame streams which later connected to the frozen lakes that spilled into the Shivering Sea upon which they sail today.

In between deserts of frozen tundra, Jon found peaks of mountains made entirely of ice. He found more than one oasis where hot water bubbled up from the ground, sometimes hidden in caves and sometimes hidden in mountain sides, where the heat of the pools thawed the ground. It was the only green Jon would see for miles. The forests they came upon were deep green, almost black, hiding animals and the people who hunted those animals. Snow softened the jagged edges of the landscape but the truth was, there were more cliffs, more ravines, rock and lake, than he’d ever seen living in Winterfell. It stretched, seemingly forever, further up into the north, as if they weren’t already at the top of the map past the known edges. 

Jon had missed it, even as he’d been heart-sick for Castle Black, eager to see his brothers and to return to the Watch. He’d thought he’d knew home. 

Now, as he gazes upon the rolling cold hills in the distance and an expanse of dark ocean in front, the winds subsiding and bending to the will of the clear day, sun glaring down upon him once again, Jon’s happy he’s back. Falling in love with something like this, with the great expanse of nature, is liberating. Even despite the conditions that have led him back to it. 

Tormund, freed and allowed to go anywhere on the ship despite the unease of Stannis’ men and the brothers of the Watch, sits next to him on bundles of rope, looking like a great bear sunbathing. His face is turned up towards the sun and the longer he stays in it the quicker color returns to his face, beard and hair catching fire and glowing a startling red. When they’d first met, Jon had thought Tormund an indomitable but handsome man and not much has changed since.

Jon realizes he’s been staring only when Tormund opens his eyes and they lazily slant over to his, catching him in the act. Tormund gives him a knowing look, but otherwise remains silent while the other brothers of the Watch clamor behind them.

Some had never been on a ship. Neither had Jon, but Tormund looks particularly comfortable with the speed at which they are sailing and the salty air hitting his face. 

Jon has a growing suspicion that a piece of the wilderness, a clipping he’d thought dead, has decided to settle between his lungs and let its first roots inside him. He’d thought it was there because of Ygritte, but even there he’s proven wrong. It has secreted itself inside his body, in his mind, while Jon had played at being smart, and done the same with the Free Folk. But Mance Rayder is gone now, and Jon has a different goal. It’s the third day of their week long trip to Hardhome, and Jon is growing restless with the ease he feel returning to these lands. 

He glances back at Tormund again, and the man is still staring at him. Once, it would have been unnerving. Once, he wound wonder what the mind behind the gaze was plotting for him. But after so long, he’s gotten used to Tormund’s, and the Free Folk, way. Tormund looks because he wishes to see something not because he has any schemes. Jon wishes he’d have found it liberating before, as he does now. 

Finally, Tormund raises his eyebrows and in a conspiratorial tone says, “ _ You’ve a piece of it in you, don’t you Snow? Can’t cut it out, can’t cure it. It’s in your blood _ .” 

He’s speaking the free folk tongue that Jon heard each day he’d been with them. Only a few spoke common and rarely at him.

Jon frowns against the grating vowel of the other language, and at the fact that Tormund could read him so well. Instead of replying he turns and sits beside him. Tormund is an easy and simple company now when all the brothers, even Edd, only wish to talk about what’s to come. 

Tormund’s been infuriating the past three days but at least he needles Jon on different topics. Somehow, something had shifted between them to allow for it. He’s stopped being  _ boy _ and  _ baby crow _ , and become Jon Snow. Jon thinks it happened when Tormund had stood just to look him evenly in the eye and Jon had unlocked his shackles. 

There’s something knowing hiding in Tormund’s gaze, but the man seems content to hold that knowledge to himself. 

“It’s cold here,” Jon notes. The winds that blow up the sails, giving them the speed they need to reach Hardhome, aren’t too kind to the rest of the ship and its crew. 

“ _ Don’t be a pussy _ ,” Tormund says gazing back up at the sky. It’s so familiar and easy-going despite their situation, that it makes Jon huff out a laugh. He hides it with his gloved hand, but Tormund sees, and smirks in return. 

Jon understands how Tormund would be happy to be back to his frozen lands but for whatever reason he’s also happy to be back with Jon. It makes little sense. In fact, it make no sense at all. Ygritte he could understand. He thought he could understand the other Free Folk as well but Tormund is something else. A lunatic, maybe, a crazy son of a bitch, but nobody ever claimed crazy sons of bitches weren’t smart.

The others, especially Edd, don’t trust Tormund yet. The only reason why they feel comfortable going to sleep is that Jon vouches for him. Even then, it’s a struggle. However, it isn’t Tormund who needs to prove to be trustworthy. When Jon revealed his hand far too early and Tormund ordered others to kill him, he’d grabbed Ygritte, tried to calm her, saved her life, while Jon could do nothing but run. He cares for his people. That speaks more of him as a man than any pretty word Jon can use to defend him.

In his own way, he’d cared for Jon when he’d thought Jon was one of them. Advice was ample, even when not asked for, ranging from the topics that sparked within his mind on any given day. It had made Jon feel accepted more than he’d ever felt in Winterfell’s dining hall. 

Trust is a difficult thing to gain from any of the Free Folk. In the end, only ever Ygritte and Tormund trusted him and he’d had broken that trust.

Jon looks out into the steel mountains on his left that tower just beyond the beaches. Stannis’ ships wizely follow the shore. It would do nobody any good should they be lost to open water. The Shivering Sea is black and terrible. Jon feels should he even dip a hand, it would sap away all the strength and life out of him.

_ “You’re as still as a frozen chicken _ ,” he hears beside him. Tormund shifts and sits up from where he’d been slouching by Jon’s side. When Jon doesn’t reply he says,  _ “You don’t have to be embarrassed about speaking now you know. They’re not going to hear you.” _

He gestured towards the mostly empty ship deck. Those who had been there before, doing morning chores, have retreated back into the relative warmth of the hold.

“ _ I’m not embarrassed _ ,” Jon replies, far too briskly.

The corner of Tormund’s mouth lifts into a victorious smirk as he shifts closer to Jon. It’s a good look on him, though it irritates Jon just the same. 

There’s at least a dozen layers between them and yet Jon can still sense the immense heat radiating from Tormund’s body, as if he runs on warmer blood than the rest of them. Jon is reminded of Ghost, who would curl around his legs at Castle Black.

“ _ Their leader using the terrible wild-man speech? I know enough how your lot works. They’d think you’ve grown wild too,”  _ Tormund replies. “ _ Only I know for a fact you have _ .”

Jon lets out a tired sigh. “What do you want?”

Their gaze holds for a handful of heartbeats, within which Tormund grows serious and his blue eyes sharpen and clear. Then he makes a sound in his throat, a waves his hand, falling back into the ropes. The tension he’d felt dissipates as quickly as it appeared.

“ _ It’s not as easy to get a rise out of you as before. _ ” 

It’s made more as a comment rather than anything else, and yet John can’t stop feeling slightly proud with himself.

“And here I thought you’d talk my ear off about Stannis or even about the clothes.”

Jon insisted on wearing the black, as did the rest, though they would have been better equipped wearing furs. Tormund makes a dismissive gesture, as if it doesn’t concern him. That gesture says, ‘If you’re killed for it, it’s not going to be  _ my  _ fault.’

“ _ You’re the only one out of this lot,”  _ he waves his hand encompassing the whole ship, “ _ that sees us Free Folk as people. _ ”

“So?” 

“ _ You need to be something, to know it, _ ” Tormund replies with a cocky smile, as if that were obvious. Infuriating bastard.

“I thought we’ve well established that I’m a Crow,” Jon replies, stubbornly, in common. 

Back when he’d first come to the Free Folk, when he could not yet understand their language, they’d call him Crow more than by his name. Jon was dull and Snow, to them, was silly. They liked descriptors like, for instance, Giantsbane. Crow labeled him; told them to watch out, told them to be wary. In the end, the moniker stuck since it got a reaction out of him. 

He’s proven to Tormund he  _ is  _ a Crow. After all, he’d betrayed his trust, killed his men, imprisoned him. He proved to be what everyone expected him to be, what they all feared him to be. 

However Tormund’s eyes are not angry but thoughtful, as if Jon has said something particularly interesting. 

“ _ The last one I heard call you that was Ygritte _ ,” Tormund says voice thick with something. Maybe not regret, but certainly emotion through which Jon cannot tell. He doesn’t know Tormund well enough. 

The pain in Jon’s chest flares at the mention of her, and he waits for it to subside to speak again. “Thank you. For telling me to return her to the north.”

Tormund chuckles softly but it’s short lived. He hits Jon’s shoulder with his own in that sort of easy camaraderie Jon has lost privilege to long ago. “ _ It’s proper, _ ” shrugs. “ _ But funeral aren’t for the dead. _ ”

Jon frowns. “What does that mean?”

“ _ All that love you have for her, all the grief? It had nowhere to go. It would have poisoned you. Funerals are like bloodletting. When the worst flows out, you can heal. Sure, you’re left with a scar, and you carry it your whole life, but then you have space for something else again. _ ”

Jon had never considered that. He looks away and towards the terrible cold sea. He mulls over the words, and each time he repeats them in his mind, he feels something within himself loosen. 

When he looks back, Tormund looks tired. 

“Let’s go get some wine downstairs,” Jon offers, standing once more. He offers Tormund a hand to help him get up, even though Tormund could very easily drag him down. He has a head, and a few dozen pounds on Jon at the very least. 

All Tormund does, however, is grumble, take Jon’s hand, and say, “Peh, your grape water is as strong as my piss.” 

Amused, Jon turns towards the deck. He catches sight of Olly for a split moment, but then the boy’s gone. 

####  -

Tormund’s pestering and complaining continues until they’re just outside of Hardhome. At the sight of it he falls quiet and grows serious, which Jon finds all the more telling of the shit situation they’re in. The feeling of unease grows when they shore up and Jon sees Hardhome from within. 

That which has been unravelling and relaxing within him at the sight of the eternal winter grows stiff when distrustful eyes turn towards him. 

“Do you trust me?” Tormund asks him in common. It’s as much for him as it’s for the other brothers of the Watch to hear. 

“Does that make me a fool?” he replies, as they go further into camp, the people around them closing in, curious as to who they are.

“We’re fools together now,” Tormund states, just before a whistle cuts the air and the Lord of Bones shambles towards them with an entourage.

Jon remembers him. What he doesn’t remember is whatever dialect Tormund and he are using to converse. It matters little; the man says something out of line which makes Tormund act. It’s not anger, not really. Tormund is far too smart for anger. It’s not in his nature outside of a proper battle, and even then, he usually keeps a cool head. This is tactics. 

It works, even as they side-step the Lord of Bones’ beaten carcas. Jon had wanted to talk with the Elders not kill someone, but it seems that it has gotten them a chance at the audience regardless of the violence. 

Jon wishes he could be surprised, but the Free Folk always settle their differences by might. He turns to his brothers, gives them a unifying warning, then he catches up with Tormund.

He knows there is an advantage in understanding the Free Folk culture and knowing one of their languages. Yet, he feels that, should he do anything else other than what he came here to do, which is to beg the Free Folk to flee before the terror, he would splinter apart, and all the stitches of propriety he’d managed to replace since climbing the Wall would burst, and he would become that which he has found beyond. 

The Jon that had went and the Jon that had returned to Castle Black are two people now. Mance Rayder’s death had solidified that. He is just a pretender in his own shoes now. The only thing he feels genuine about is the concern he has for the people. 

And so many of them too, Jon thinks as they walk into camp. He can hear bits and pieces of different tongues, and he can see different clans and brotherhoods with their distinctive markings. Mance Rayder’s camp stretches out for leagues and all are present. All have rallied to his cause. And the man is dead, only a pile of ashes. 

Tormund halts and with him, Jon comes to a stop. “We’re going to the big house,” he says nodding towards a circular house built a little ways up and out of the way. “No guards.”

He leaves his brothers with the boats and with the warning not to do anything stupid. If he is to be at the mercy of people who have hated his kind for generations that doesn’t mean they can’t escape. 

The elders constitute of clan leaders, but there are more who gather: advisors, witnesses, and those interested. The Free Folk are like that: their leaders don’t make decisions for them  _ without _ their presence. 

Jon, through sheer luck, leaves a few allies richer and a night falling far too quickly for comfort. He needs to send word to Stannis’ ships, to prepare them for oncoming boats, first thing in the morning. There’s nothing they can do now. 

“Karsi says your men can sleep in her part of the camp tonight,” Tormund says when he re-joins them later.He must have worked his ass off to pull something like that. 

“Thank you.” 

Tormund grunts in easy acceptance, then takes a seat with them around the fire for supper. 

Jon doesn’t notice Edd’s look, because at least Edd learned subtlety, but the others have yet to learn how to look by not looking. He doesn’t know what has caught their attention. Tormund and he are speaking in common so they can be understood. 

After they’re done eating, Tormund stands. “Come on, lads.” He leads them to the tent they’ll be sleeping in, but when Jon is about to go in, he stops him. “Not you. We have to entertain.”

“Entertain...who?” Jon asks, skeptical. 

“Karsi, who else? How did you think I got this?” he asks gesturing at the tent. Jon has enough time to tell the others he’s leaving before he’s dragged off to another, much well-equipped, tent that can house more than eight travelers. 

He remembers how camps used to be and what Mance Rayder’s tent used to be like. The Chieftainess’ tent is tall enough to allow for a fire and wide to allow more than a dozen people inside. In each corner groups sit, talking, drinking, and at the head of the camp sits Karsi. She sees them and beckons them over with a welcoming shout that Tormund returns, and greets her properly before settling into the furs thrown over the packed dirt for seating. 

There’s little comfort to be found with the Free Folk, but the chieftains have always had more, elders the most, and besides, if they always favored one thing, it was to lay their head on something softer than ice, so if they should fall to winter-frost and never awaken, their last heartbeats might be well-rested. 

Tormund is a chieftain himself, and he fits with Karsi’s people as if he were one of them. Jon, on the other hand, has never been invited to drink with the chiefs. He has no stories to tell. Nothing, at least, that would entertain one like Karsi.

Jon sits next to Tormund so the side of his face is turned toward him. It’s a handsome profile, Jon thinks, aware of himself more than he would have been back in Winterfell, when he so obviously never could sit at the high table. 

His ear is not accustomed to the accent in which Karsi speaks, and he needs a few minutes to understand what she’s saying. She asks Tormund about the trip here and the weather signs, and some other chieftain things Jon knows little about. There’s some history between them and there’s more that has happened that Tormund need to relay to Karsi 

However, once they’re finished, Karsi turns her eyes to him and says, “ _ You’re young to be a Lord Commander. I thought fat old people always guarded fat old castles _ .” She seems pleased with him, at least.

“ _ Aye, that’s usually how it goes _ ,” Jon agrees. Tormund seems amused to hear him speak in their tongue, finally bending to the higher will of politeness.

“ _ So whose fat castle are you going to defend after we’ve gone south _ ?” she asks. 

Jon looks at Tormund for a moment, but there’s no warning in his gaze. He knows, already, that Jon will tell the truth. But politics have never been able to be summed up in only a few words.

“ _ Nobody’s. I’ll be defending life itself. _ ”

Karsi looks at him, and the moment stretches, as fire dances in her pale blue eyes. The silence grows with it, and Jon, mistified, cannot turn away. In the distance, he can hear barking dogs, and in his mind the soft padding of Ghost’s feet over the snow. Beyond it, the winds over the Shivering Sea howl.

He watches as a corner of Karsi’s mouth lifts and her expression breaks. She begins laughing and Tormund heartily joins her in the endeavor. Jon wants to be cross with them but he cannot. Such glee is infectious, drawing out a smile on his face, and heat to his cheeks. 

“ _ Life itself _ ,” Karsi repeats, “ _ You’re so serious _ , Crow.” 

She turns to her people and shouts for someone to get them something to drink.

“ _ I was telling you _ ,” Tormund says under his breath to Karsi. Jon doesn’t know where he’d found the time to gossip about him, and he isn’t sure whether to be pleased or not.

The first draw of drink is Karsi’s, and the next is Tormund’s. When they hand the skin to Jon, he wonders if it would be too rude to refuse. It’s not that he’s drinking with the Free Folk, as much as it’s the fact that he really cannot stomach fermented goat’s milk. 

Karsi laughs at him again. “ _ You looks fish-sick,  _ Crow _. Have you never tried rkhja before?” _

“ _ Oh no, Snow’s had it, _ ” Tormund laughs. 

He knows, of course. The first time Jon tried it, he kept it down, only to vomit ten minutes later. At the time, Tormund had been compassionately making fun of him, saying,  _ ‘There you go, boy. We’ll make something of you yet.’  _ Now, Tormund’s mocking him for it.

Each time after had gotten easier. Jon sighs, takes a swig, tries not to taste it, and pretends it’s the worst ale he’s ever had. Tormund always knows how to irritate him enough into doing something he knows he’ll regret. 

He passes the skin off to Karsi, who’s laughing at him with her eyes, if not with her voice.  _ “So, Snow, _ ” she says,  _ “have you heard the story of Malamuk’s Head?” _

This is what Jon feared -- storytelling. He’d learned it was important to the Free Folk around the time he’d listened to them talk about giant-killing and snow spiders. They have their oral stories, passed down since the First Men, which live among them like the New Gods live amongst the southern lands.

Jon had tutors to teach him how to write and read, he had instructors on how to hunt, and a whole castle to tell him right from wrong. All the lessons the Free Folk ever need in their life are in their stories, told to their children since before they’ve even opened their eyes. 

He knows that if one gives a story one must take a story and Jon’s never been the one particularly good with his words, unlike his sisters and brothers. 

And yet, he still has to admit that, no, he hasn’t heard the story of Malamuk’s Head, and Karsi is far too gleeful when she begins telling it. 

In a true Free Folk fashion, it’s terrifying and funny. Had it ever been said anywhere near castle walls, it would have alarmed the  _ civilized _ men who sat in them. Tormund is happy to pass the skin between them, drinking, as Karsi tells her story. When she’s done, Tormund takes the scene, never the one to be outdone. 

“ _ Snow, I don’t think I ever did tell you why I got the name Giantsbane, _ ” Tormund says, grinning. His enthusiasm is infectious, though Jon feels his cheeks warm more than anything else.

Halfway through Karsi can’t keep a straight face and keeps laughing, while Jon’s head fills with wool, and he begins to sway, drunk. “No,” he says, sounding horrified even to himself. “ _That’s_ _not-- Tormund_.”

“ _ And then, I go to bed with his wife, and she feeds me giant’s milk for three months. She thinks I’m her baby. That’s how I grew up to be so strong, _ ” Tormund finishes, but he too, can’t maintain his serious expression and the three of them laugh. 

  
“ _ How about you _ ?” Karsi asks after taking hold of the skin.

He’d been trying to think up something but all Old Nan’s stories have come true., That which remains are memories of old legends told to be the history of their kingdom. So he starts with, “ _ In a land called  _ Old Valyria _ , there were dragons _ .”

He tells them of the three dragon riders, brother and sisters, he tells them of magic, and of how they fought and got to rule the southern lands, all except Dorne, who knew how to throw a spear better than any other. 

His speech begins slurring by the end, and he can barely keep himself upright. Thankfully, he’s near Tormund. When he leans into one side Tormund catches him, laughs, and says, “ _ Took you long enough, bastard. That’s not really a fun story _ .”

“ _ They say each time a Targaryen is born, the gods flip a coin. One is good, and one is terrible. Like Mad King Aerys. He burned people alive. He wanted to burn the whole world _ .”   
  


“ _ And you let these kind of people rule you _ ?” Karsi says, sounding vaguely disappointed. 

“ _ There was an uprising _ ,” Jon explains. 

“ _ Common sense, at last _ ,” Karsi retorts. She says something else, but all Jon can hear is buzzing in his ears. He blinks, tries to shake the weight of the alcohol off his mind, but he can’t. 

“ _ What is wrong with him _ ?” Karsi’s voice swims in and out. “ _ Drunk?  _ Tormund--  _ twenty years-- old enough. And you’re an old man--” _

He hears Tormund’s loud, “ _ Hey! I’m only thirty-fo-- _ ” and then again, what feels much later, a gruff voice telling him, “Just sleep  _ vranjska _ . Tomorrow we’ll need you sharp, eh?”

Jon sleeps.

####  -

Death follows every battlefield. Ever since people learned how to swing a stone, sharpen a rock, shoot an arrow, so long have they known how to kill. The Iron Throne rests on the bones of the defeated and the dead and on the subjugation of the less powerful who can do nothing but be extorted. The kingdom is ruled by fear.

Who dares go against the rule of their rightful king, who saved them from the madness of a tyrant? It’s the fear of reciprocation that motivates most men. Fear of death is all that awaits those not noble. 

Death should be familiar to Jon. But it’s not. He’d never expected it to gaze back at him with crystal blue eyes. He’d never expected it to strike such fear inside him, that all he could do was run. 

Now, as they sail back towards Castle Black, he can think of nothing else. 

He knew this was what would happen, but knowing did not prepare him enough. They’d left too many behind. Barely half the Free Folk had been on the ships. The rest, slaughtered. They serve the Night King now. 

“All we can do is be glad we’ve survived,” Tormund says to him, more quiet than usual, slouched in the chair in Jon’s cabin. There’s a skin of wine resting on his belly, but he’s given up trying to get drunk off of it. 

There’s nothing like the rush of death to make you realize what you value the most. Jon is glad Tormund is not dead. It’s difficult, however, to say it. But, he suspects, Tormund wouldn’t be here had he not felt the same. 

The weight of the lost lives are a heavy burden on Jon’s shoulders, but he has to concede to Tormund’s point. They saved more than they would have had they never sailed. They will have that much less dead to fight, when the time comes. 

“I know we did all we could but...” Jon sighs, and looks at Tormund who, thankfully, nods. He understands. Those were his people and now two dozen ships sail half-empty. 

“You’re a sullen bastard even on the regular,” Tormund tells him. “No use in adding to it now.” 

“I’m not the only one brooding,” John retorts. 

“Brooding,” Tormund repeats. It’s a new word for him. “I thought that was for chickens.”

Despite himself, Jon lets out a laugh and says, “You are drunk.”

“No, but I really fucking wish I was.” 

Jon looks down at the table where his goblet lays, half-drunk, and feels the sentiment. But Jon is rarely the person to find solution in wine. He’s seen too many ‘good’ men twisted by it, and he fears what he might show should he indulge. 

The embarrassment from waking in Karsi’s tent follows him still. He knew what the brothers thought. The reality had been much different. After all, when he’d woken up, the whole tent had been turned into a sleeping room, and had Jon stretched a bit, he could have touched the top of someone’s head. Next to him, Tormund had awakened moment later, laughed quietly at him, and said, ‘ _ Let’s go get cleaned up _ .’

“You should go lie down,” Jon tells Tormund. 

His cabin comes equipped with a bed, one Jon knows he won’t be using tonight. 

“You know, when I thought about invading a southerner’s bed, I never thought it was going to be yours.”

Jon chuckles softly. “It’s not invasion if I invite you.”

It was meant in jest. Few things are allowed to brothers of the watch, and even fewer aren’t frowned upon. Jon had thought he’d kept his thoughts well to himself, lest he make anyone uncomfortable, and destabilize his position as Lord Commander. Not to mention, it was never the time, never the place, never the chance. 

But Jon was born with two good eyes. All he  _ can _ do is look. Until now, when he’s feels he’s stepped in hot water all on his own accord. 

Tormund’s bushy, red eyebrows rise. “How cheeky. Aren’t you afraid for you chastity?”

Tormund stands and leaves the wine skin on the top of the table. Instead of going to the bed, Tormund rounds the table and leans against it. He keeps Jon’s gaze fimly, and there’s a warmth in his eyes Jon had never before recognized. 

“We’ve slept in the same camp plenty other times.”

This is dangerous, John thinks, even as his heart begins pounding quickly. He shifts in his chair, and Tormund takes that as some sort of invitation. The man smiles, slow and warm, eyebrows rising up. “Do you find me attractive, Jon Snow?”   
  


Jon can’t lie to him. He will know then, both that Jon does and that he tries to hide it. Instead, he says, “I find you very brave, my friend. And also, very irritating.”

“That isn’t a no,” Tormund observes. 

“Neither is it a yes.” 

An infuriating smirk spreads across his face before Tormund chuckles. “You know there is little to be ashamed of. I  _ am _ quite attractive.”

Jon sighs, rubbing his brow. He can’t really deny it, and the confidence itself, though Jon would never admit it aloud, was what got his attention most of the time. Tormund is cheerful, enjoying life when he can, serious when he must be. He has two huge hands Jon thought about more than necessary, and a gaze that made Jon do stupid things.

Unfortunately for both of them involved, Jon can’t afford to be stupid now. “I know you lot don’t see things like that but here two men...aren’t considered...natural.” 

Tormund sighs, and straightens up. “So are you disgusted or are you afraid of getting caught?”

Their eyes catch. Tormund is daring him. Jon pushes himself out of his chair, irritation fueling his path. Then his gloved hands are fisting into Tormund’s skins to pull him forward and their mouths are crushing together. Jon’s teeth clack painfully against Tormund’s, until the man remembers to kiss back but when he does Jon forgets all about proving a point. It’s too hurried, too hard, and yet, when they part, Tormund tilts Jon’s head and leans down for more. 

Jon’s hands cratch past his cheeks, around his neck, and Tormund steps forward, and gets a hand around his waist to bring him closer. It’s better, it’s  _ good _ . Tormund’s mouth is warm, and he kisses fiercely until they’re both out of breath. It’s easy, easier than it should be. A little desperate true, but Jon’s stealing moment he knows he cannot afford.

Jon lets out a few sounds in his throat, and when he pushes Tormund away, he feels his skin tingling from Tormund’s bear. The man looks at him, and it’s a consuming sort of gaze, as if someone has lit a fire and let it burn down the whole house.

Jon wants him and it terrifies him how little that bothers him. He has no instructions, no experience, he has vows, and he knows how reckless he can be with blood pumping in his ears. 

He sucks in a loud breath when Tormund’s hand hardens around his waist. It sends a thrill down his spine, and he feels himself twitching in his britches. Jon puts a hand on his chest, but Tormund covers it with his own and leans down so they’re breathing the same air. Jon shouldn’t, he really shouldn’t, but he closes his eyes, and lets Tormund kiss him again. It unravels slowly, carefully. Jon feels himself being held, as much as he feels Tormund’s tongue. The kiss sparks something inside him, and it lights up.

Were he someone else, somewhere else, he may have allowed it to continue. Yet, when he breaks the kiss, he feels regret first, before duty fills the spot.

“Tormund just-- it’s better not,” he says. His hands are on Tormund’s chest, creating distance between them. “I’m sorry.”

The disappointment is loud in the silence that follows and in the way Tormund steps away, expression clears. 

“Well, if you change your mind you know where I am,” Tormund says. Jon’s surprise must be visible on his face but Tormund is not unkind about it. He takes a step back, and then he’s on the other side of the desk again. “But, I’m still claiming your bed.”

Despite himself, Jon smiles when Tormund launches himself at the bed, which creaks and cracks until Tormund finally settles. Soon enough, his belly-deep snores follow. Some things, Jon supposes, shouldn’t change. 

####  -

From Hardhome to Eastwatch there’s a hundred and fifty miles by sea, swallowed up in two days by the ships thanks to good weather. It had taken Jon’s party eight days by horses to get to the eastern outpost. With five thousand of the Free Folk returning with him, there’s not a horse breeder in the world who can supply them with the steeds necessary for a just as quick return journey. They will have to to go by foot back to Castle Black. They’re looking at at least a month of walking if they’re lucky. 

That is the reason why he sends Edd and the rest on the horses ahead of the horde. 

“I sent a raven from the ships that we’ve been successful, but you should prepare for our arrival,” he tells Edd who looks more solemn than he’d looked before. 

“You should come with us. You’re Lord Commander,” Edd replies, even as he’s mounting his horse. 

“I can’t do that. They see me leaving, it gives them doubt. I’ll go with them ‘till the lands they were promised,” Jon says, handing Edd the reins. 

Edd looks over the Eastwatch courtyard, looks as if he has something else to say, but whatever it is, in the end he keeps it to himself. He simply nods, and says, “We’ll be looking for you.”

Jon watch as he, Pyp, Yoren, Olly and the rest ride out. They all give him an uncertain look, as if they wish to tell him he’s being stupid, but that they’re following his orders because they don’t want to even think about the worst that might happen. Jon appreciates it but there’s little to fear from the Free Folk. Not as long as Tormund is with him, and even then, all the clans separately agreed to go with Jon. He may have broken faith with them once, but he won’t do so again. 

The horse Jon rode to get to Eastwatch he offers to the Folk, to help carry the old or the lame. Its white mane disappears in the sea of grey furs that pour into the crevice left between an ancient forest and the Wall like a river busting through a dam.

Jon had never marched before. He’s known fatigue but none like this, where his feet hurt up to the shins, swollen in twice their size. He doesn’t know the pain immediately either, because there is always something to do, even though they’re moving. A cart gets stuck, or a kid runs into the forest, or someone is sick. Sometimes there are disagreements Jon wisely leaves Tormund to solve, and just before nightfall the torrent stops, groans like a bear, and settles for the night. They dip into the forest then to hunt for food, light the fires, and have a meal. 

With the Free Folk, Jon sees one is never truly alone. At first, it’s only Tormund who shares his fire and never for too long. Then one clan head comes the next day, another the day after that. Jon wishes Karsi were there, but she’s gone. Her sister takes care of her two babes, barely older than Rickon when Jon had left Winterfell. 

They talk or don’t, and soon their curiosity is satisfied and they leave him be, sitting with their families once again.

Another night passes, and the giant decides to seek them out. With him come the kids who, it seems, were curious. At first Jon only notices them from the corner of his eye, and only because Jon’s always looking for something, usually at Tormund. The forests are old, and there is no question whether a bear or a wolf could get drawn by the smell of food, or a kid would wander in and get lost. 

It’s only another night until they finally decide that hiding is boring, or they grow hungry. Tormund beckons them over, pours them each a bowl of stew and gives them a piece of bread Jon had prepared amongst the supplies for the road back. The kids  _ listen  _ to him, sit and eat. Only after they’re done, do they start wiggling where they’re sitting and start asking questions, or picking and poking at them. Tormund gives brief answers, but he never  _ ignores _ them or chastises them for asking, as Jon had been chastised for speaking out of turn. Tormund is  _ good _ with them.

“ _ Do you have to wear this coat? _ ” a girl, no older than six, asks him as she picks at the furs that guard his neck from the cold. 

“ _ Why is got to be black anyway?” _ another asks, sitting next to him, eyes wide and brown, a splash of freckles over her nose. 

A girl a little older than the two, who is sitting by Tormund’s side eating her rabbit stew says, “ _ Because he’s a  _ Crow _. Duh. _ ”

Tormund chuckles softly. He says something Jon doesn’t understand which sounds like  _ ‘vrana’  _ or  _ ‘vranjska’;  _ certainly familiar to Jon though he can’t quite place it. Whatever it means the kids start laughing. 

A boy comes barreling next to her, almost knocking her over and Tormund sighs, picks him up as if he were a pup and plops him down in front of the fire. It’s done with such ease, Jon doesn’t know whether to be impressed or just to find it infuriatingly attractive. Jon’s never been good with kids. 

The boy doesn’t really take it as an offence. He lays there until he gets bored, then sits up and proclaims, “ _ How do you find so many black wolves to skin?” _

Jon looks at Tormund who is softly amused. He looks at Jon, cocks and eyebrow and says, “ _ He wears it to match his hair.” _

The girl next to Jon stops the pinching of his furrs and nods, like that’s a fair assessment. She turns to Tormund and says, “ _ Shouldn’t you wear red then?”  _

Tormund laughs. “ _ I can’t steal the fire’s color now can I?” _

“ _ What about the wolves?”  _ the boy cries, left ignored. 

“ _ We use powders to color the clothes _ ,” Jon explains. “ _ And all the  _ Crows  _ have to wear it because it’s like our--”  _ Jon halts missing words. He’s not as fluent as he would have liked to be. “ _ To look different. Like the Thenns have markings. Down south, people know where they belong by the color of their clothes.” _

“ _ That’s stupid _ ,” says the girl sitting next to Tormund. “ _ What if you want to wear the same thing like someone else _ ?”

“Jon  _ can’t,”  _ Tormund says, “ _ he’s the leader of  _ Crows _. _ ”

The girl looks Jon up and down. “ _ Doesn’t look very impressive.” _

Tormund laughs, smacking his knee. “ _ You heard that Jon? You’re not impressive.” _

“ _ Worse things  _ have _ been said,”  _ Jon replies, shrugging. 

“Don’t worry,” Tormund tells him, switching to common. The children must not know it well enough to understand. “You’re very impressive to me.”

Jon feels his face warming, and though he wants to scoff, he finds the situation too easy-going for it. Tormund and he have always exchanged jabs and snide compliments, only now, Jon knows Tormund means them in the way Jon wishes they meant. And Tormund’s doing it just because he wants to, not expecting anything in return. 

“I’m not wrangling four kids by myself,” Jon shoots back.

“You pick up a thing or two after you get two of your own,” Tormund admits. 

At once, Jon remembers that, true, Tormund had told him he had two daughters. Jon had forgotten it in favor of focusing on getting the Free Folk to trust him, to go with him. 

Now, Jon wonders how much older Tormund is than him, if there is a wife, if Tormund had been married the whole time. Jon had  _ kissed _ him. 

“Did they -- I mean are they here?” It’s the more important question after all. He can’t imagine someone like Tormund, who obviously likes kids, not spending time with his own. 

“They were the first two I packed into the ships,” Tormund admits. “Their mother had other ideas. They’re somewhere in the middle of the horde with her I think.”

Jon nods. “How big are they?”

Tormund smiles proudly. “Drys is ten. Quiet as a mouse that one, will be a good hunter. Munda is thirteen. Already training to be a spearwoman, like her mother.”

“You  _ have _ to be married too, aren’t you Crow?” the girl by Tormund’s side asks. Her accent is heavy, but Jon can understand her common easily.

Jon shakes his head. “Crows can’t marry. We take vows that forbid it. If we break them we’re punished.”

The girl frowns and looks at Tormund, as if to say, ‘that’s can’t be right’ but Tormund’s too busy laughing. 

“Good you’re no longer married then.”

Jon laughs with him, only because Tormund’s laugh is infection, then the meaning of his words sink in. “Wait, I was never married.”

Tormund turns towards him, frowning. “Yes, you were. To Ygritte. You  _ kidnapped  _ her. And she did not kill you. What’s confusing about that?” 

He does not appear to be joking. Their eyes meet over the fire and his face shifts. “You didn’t know did you. She never told you.”

“No, she didn’t,” Jon says, sounding defeated even to himself. 

Tormund falls silent. Then, after a moment, says, “Well, if it’s easier on you, since you didn’t have a child, it doesn’t really count anyway.”

“Marriage isn’t exactly...it doesn’t really come down to just having children does it?”

“This kind does,” Tormund says.

Jon pushes down the frustration he feels and says, “What other kind of marriage is there?”

“You probably have this one too: when you love someone, when you want to see them grow old, there’s that type of marriage --  _ veza _ . And then, there’s the type of marriage where you find someone to have little ones with -- _ odnos _ . Almost everybody does that.”

Jon blinks then sighs and says, “I’m not following.”

Tormund laughs. “How do you think we keep our numbers, Jon? When we come of age we go looking for a wife. But see, we have to be a good match.  _ Our women don’t want anybody weak, then the little ones _ ,” he says tickling the little boy who’d come to sit down next to him, “ _ are going to be weak as well. _ ”

_ “If she kills you, well, you’re just not good enough for her. If you can stop her from slitting your throat, they you’ve earned each others respect. You do your duty to your people, and then move on. _ ”

“ _ Move on _ ,” Jon repeats. “ _ You mean you don’t stay together _ ?”

“ _ Some do. I had three younger sisters. Some look for other wives to make children with. But most of us want someone to groom our beard with when we’re old _ .”   
  


Jon laughs. He can imagine Tormund with a waist-long beard, gone pale with age. Then it dawns on him. 

“ _ So, you were..  _ are  _ married _ ?” Jon asks.   
  


_ “I did my duty Jon, not looking to make any more babies. _ ” Tormund leers at him, dragging his eyes across him, in such a way that makes Jon feel indecent. “ _ Well, unless you’re hiding something else in your britches other than a coc- _ ”

“ _ I’m _ ,” Jon cuts him off, looking at the children around him. “ _ fairly certain I’m still a man. _ ”

Tormund looks fond. “ _ Nobody ever said you needed a pecker to be a man _ .”

Jon nods, then runs his hand through his hair. That isn’t something Jon had really considered or expected. 

“ _ I don’t know why you don’t do it our way, it would be easier on everyone _ ,” Tormund comments. The children, who seem to be familiar with this topic and who’ve been playing games amongst themselves, turn and nod. 

Jon, silently, agrees. “ _ We’re too hung up on inheritance and family names. On  _ legitimacy _. I know who my father was but I’m still a bastard, because my mother wasn’t his wife _ .”

“ _ Ah see, that’s the issue. How are you going to have children if you marry someone with a cock _ ?”

“ _ We don’t _ ,” Jon says, “ _ we generally disprove of men having physical relationships. _ ”

Tormund makes a sound of disgust and shakes his head. “ _ That’s why you’re all kinds of fucked in my opinion _ .”

Jon can’t disagree. 

####  -

The tents they have for sleeping are made to withstand sturdy winds and heavy snowfall. They retain heat and, as Jon learns, muffle enough sound that it appears as if he has privacy. It’s comforting, considering that in the middle of a horde of people, tent after tent stretched and pitched near each other, there really is only a few feet separating them from others.

It’s the illusion that lets Jon relax and shuck off the black Lord Commander coat. Tormund has sleeping furs to cover them with, but even sleeping clothed and next to each other, he uses it for that little added warmth. After so long in the North, Jon’s learned that the cold never truly leaves you. All you can do it keep it at a arm’s length, lest it takes your fingers and toes. 

More than anything, Jon itches for a bath. If nothing else, Castle Black has rooms with four walls and a fireplace where one can heat water, have privacy and soap. Ever since discovering that Tormund tosses in his sleep until he’s half on top of and half curled around Jon, he’s needed that privacy with an increasing need. 

However, it’s the early mornings that are the worst. When all are asleep, especially if it’s snowing, Jon can only hear Tormund’s and his own breathing. All he can feel is Tormund’s beard prickling the back of his neck and warm it with his breath. He forgets himself, dazed with sleep, but even when he sobers, he still steals those moment to himself, pretending it was somewhere else. 

Jon knows were he to turn around and kiss Tormund, the man wouldn’t mind. Probably, he’d grumble about being woken up, or about morning breath -- Tormund’s borderline obsessive with cleaning his mouth each morning -- but he wouldn’t push Jon away and there would be no brothers of the Watch to judge, no castle walls to hear. Nothing but the stretch of Free Folk camp, filled with people who care little about anything else than getting a restful sleep.

He sits up before he can do something regrettable. Tormund’s forehead bumps against his hip, but he remains sleep-still, chest rising and falling in a steady, slow, rhythm. Jon takes the time to look his fill. Tormund’s hair is getting long, and his beard has grown unruly. He will be brushing it the moment he wakes. Jon’s only learned that Tormund takes pride in it since they’ve been sharing the tent. 

Jon likes his beard. It’s always been impressive to him, and as of late, Jon’s been getting an urge to touch it. 

His face is shiny with a kind of poultice the Free Folk use to fight off their skin cracking from the cold. Jon appreciates his strong nose, but it’s his eyes that Jon has always liked best. Tormund doesn’t lie. His eyes are always clear. They’re warm, or they’re cold, they’re teasing with humor, or they’re assessing. They show just how smart Tormund really is. 

Jon can’t stop looking at him. If he were allowed, Jon doesn’t think he’d ever really look away. 

Jon takes a breath. He can’t keep doing this. When they get to Castle Black, he will help the people settle in their lands, and hopefully, he will leave them to their lives. Tormund to his own. If not a wife, he has two daughters in his life. He is a chieftain. His people need him. 

Jon realizes it’s gone quiet in their tent only a moment before Tormund blinks his eyes open. They’re wide, Jon thinks feeling embarrassment flood his cheeks and the back of his neck, no sleep confusion to be found. Tormund’s been awake for a while. Worse, Jon realizes. He knows. 

Tormund’s eyes look at him, take him in, and soften. There’s too much warmth there for Jon to handle. 

“Like what you see?” Tormund asks quietly, a shadow of humor in his voice. It falls flat between them. 

Jon doesn’t realize he’s clenching his hands in the furs until Tormund touches one pries his fingers out of it, leads them over to his face. His knuckles brush over Tormund’s beard, his lips. “I’m flesh and blood, just like you,” Tormund says. “You can touch, if you wish.”

“I know,” Jon says, throat barely working.

Jon feels invisible hooks pulling his shoulders forward, pulling him towards Tormund. He wants to kiss him. The issue is stopping. Jon has never known not to jump into something feet first.

After a moment of hesitation too long from Jon, Tormund sighs. His fingers are warm as they rub circles into Jon’s hand. He shifts so he can turn completely onto his back. “You’re such an idiot,” Tormund tells him. 

Jon laughs. He is. He really is. He relaxes, knowing now there is nothing expected of him, and knowing Tormund will do nothing, except rub his hand affectionately. 

The wake up call is loud enough to shake the ground underneath them, but Jon simply continues looking at Tormund who, frowning, realizes just how tangled his bear is. 

####  -

Tormund possesses a particularly admirable quality: when he sees a problem, he acts upon it. He’s never the one to sit idly, to ponder it too long. At times, when Jon faces danger he knows to freeze. Tormund never freezes. He fights. 

Jon hears the bear too late, and when runs towards the groaning and growling, he sees a young man lying in the snow, a bear above him, and Tormund standing his ground, hefting his axe and burying it between the beast’s eyes. 

The bear falls and Tormund grunts as he rips the axe out of its skull. He turns and glares at Jon, before redirecting his gaze down at the young man. He says something to him. When Jon turns, he sees others, hunters, quiet in step behind him. 

Soon enough, the bear is butchered, skilled, and the carcass left in the woods. Then, they’re on their way. 

That night, they eat bear. 

Two nights after the incident, Tormund comes to the sleeping tent with a bundle of new skins to wear. He hands them over to Jon. 

“You know I can’t wear this,” Jon says. “You should give it to someone who needs it.”

“Keep it,” Tormund says. “I killed the bear, I can do whatever I want with the skin.”

Jon knows there’s more to it but he accepts the gift as it is. 

There is little to do in the nights than talk, and Tormund and he have been talking a lot. He thanks tormund, and they move to other themes. Hunting, rangering, until it leads Jon to ask the question he’d been wondering ever since Karsi’s tent.

“So, how  _ did  _ you get the name Giantsbane?”

Tormund smirks. “When I was ten--”

“I  _ remember _ that story,” Jon interrupts. “I mean really.”

Tormund laughs, shifting around until he settles onto his hip. “When I was younger and much less wise, I decided to go hunting giants. I took one down, then a snowstorm caught me. I had to cut open her belly, and sleep in it until it passed.”

“That is...” Jon blinks. A giant. Tormund  _ actually _ killed one. 

“Impressive?” Tormund asks, smiling. 

“Why not tell that story then?” Jon asks. 

“Because people remember you by your stories. A hundred years from now, they’ll be telling of a madmen who ]was breastfed by a giantess after killing her husband. They won’t be talking about a stupid man who killed one and got stuck in a storm.”

####  -

There’s a certain etiquette that pertains to sharing a tent with someone. Perhaps it’s different than that of the south, but generally, when you lay to sleep you try to do so quickly, not bother the person next to you, and keep your hands to yourself. 

The dawn has not come yet. Jon is, as usual, tired and yet cannot sleep. He hasn’t slept well since he’d left Winterfell. The world around him is colored grey, and his eyes have gotten used to the darkness long ago. For a while he stares at the top of the tent, and when he can no longer lie on his back he turns to look at Tormund. 

He’d learned that Tormund is a particularly light sleeper. Every shift and every crack wakes him, but he’s also as quick to fall back asleep. Now, he can see his eyes moving behind his closed lids. 

“Sleep,” he orders gruffly, knowing Jon is awake by breath now.

“Can’t,” Jon admits, just as quietly. 

“If you’re not tired by a day’s walking, they we’re not doing it right. “ He sounds exasperated. Lazily, he blinks his eyes open and says, “Should I fuck you to sleep Jon?”

Heat shoots up Jon’s spine, catching his breath and holding it hostage. 

Tormund’s eyes narrow mouth quirking. He shifts, pressing close enough for their knees to touch. Jon can feel it when his hand closes his hip. “You do don’t you? Been wondering what it feels like? What  _ I  _ feel like?”

Jon wants to responds, wants to deny it, but all he can do if force one breath out and the next in. It’s difficult to deny something he wants. He would be lying both to himself and to the man who shifts so close they’re pressing belly to belly, and rises up on elbow so he can look down at Jon.

“Crow pecked out your tongue?” Tormund asks, a lazy grin spreading over his face. 

Jon thinks to push him away. His fingers connects with his beards, linger for a moment, then run softly over his face to his jaw. “You should stop talking now,” Jon murmurs. He lifts himself up only enough to kiss him. Defeat has never felt so liberating.

Tormund moves into the kiss with his whole body. Jon cannot think. There’s nothing to think about. All he can do is feel how quick his heart is beating in his chest, Tormund’s lips against his own, the hand skimming lower to touch his cock.

“Fuck,” Jon gasps, twitching in his britches. Tormund mouths at his jaw, his neck, and when he pulls away Jon tilts his chin and Tormund kisses him as if he’d been waiting to do it the whole time. He  _ did _ , Jon realizes, but he’d been waiting. Waiting for Jon to ask it of him, not just take.

Jon grips his shoulder then his jaw. Tormund moves up, over him him, covering Jon with his bulk. Their breaths mingle, the heat beneath Jon’s skin rising, and now that he’s started kissing Tormund he can’t stop. 

He feels one of his hands on his cheek, touching him gently, so very gently, as if Tormund thinks Jon might break, but the other sneaks down his leg, gripping Jon’s thigh. Jon lifts it, hooks it around Tormund’s hip, and Tormund leans down with a pleased grunt. 

There’s a moment where Jon can’t think, and he doesn’t want to, and in the next he feels Tormund’s fingers on his britches, and then around his cock. 

Jon gasps into the kiss, breaking it, hands gripping tightly onto Tormund who hums and kisses down his neck, as much as he can reach. His hand is rough and quick but Jon needs it that way. Tormund kisses him again before he can groan out loud, curse, and Jon forgets to do it once he has the man there with him. 

“We could have,” Tormund says between breaths, “been doing this for days.”

Jon despite himself, laughs, but it’s quickly taken over by a groan. The heat is too much. It’s sweltering. He’s sweating, and there’s something primal about the way his belly twists when he realizes Tormund’s tasting it from his throat. He shakes apart under Tormund, grasping and gasping beneath him, while Tormund brushes back the hair from his face and kisses him and keeps kissing him until his breath evens out. 

“What about you?” Jon asks. 

The corner of his mouth lifts. “You’ll make it up to me. Later.”

In the morning nobody looks at them, nobody questions them. There is nothing but grim faces by day, relaxed ones by evening. 

Jon makes good on his promise. Though he can offer nothing but his hand, and there’s too many clothes and furs, somehow they manage to make up for it, and when they don’t get off, they kiss as if there’s nothing better to do. There really isn’t when it’s only a handful of hours separating them from another full day’s walk. Castle Black starts showing soon, and from there, brothers ride out to finally greet the head of the horde. 


	2. Tormund

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tormund's POV because I love that ginger bastard.

The disquiet and disapproval echo in the bustling halls of Castle Black. With their arrival, the Crow nest has been more a gate to let his people through, than a guardian holding them back. Just as Jon had promised, with the help of his kneeler king, they spend days after arrival settling people in the lands outside of the gates. 

It’s heartbreaking to recognize the clans, and to know just how many they lost. It’s worse seeing how many aren’t there. They’d sent the women and children to the ships first, and that is who Tormund sees of most. His people are distrustful, and Tormund can smell fear. He cannot blame them. They all saw the inevitable. They all saw what Tormund had seen, and what has given Jon restless nights without sleep. 

But Free Folk are no sheep. They won’t allow themselves to be herded much longer. Already, he sees clans joining together so as to better provide for one other, he sees women taking stock and counting the provisions, skins and tents. The land given to them is fertile, true, but they won’t be able to work it. Not with the frost already settling in, and besides, there are few who know the craft. The scouts look to the forests instead, and hunters are banding together. There are few wounded, and even fewer old. Those that remain take care of the children who, it seems, are faring the best with this change. 

In the busyness of the people, Tormund catches sight of two familiar brown heads. He’d bundled them onto the first boats to go out to the Shivering Sea even though their mother had been stubborn. It hadn’t been his business. Now he is glad to see them alive. He’d visited them the first chance he had, to see they are alive with his own two eyes. But now, a room waits for him between stern walls of Castle Black, given to him by an ever more serious man.

Tormund reasons with himself that he hadn’t lived so long by being a fool. Being dishonest with others was a surefire way of earning a knife in the neck, but being dishonest with oneself made twisted work and twisted minds. It never helped anybody. He is aware of his changed perspective on Jon Snow.

Trust given twice over is bound to be a fool’s errand, and yet, Tormund believed Jon when he’d asked for it. Now, Tormund begins to think the man just might lead them through the Long Night. He is also aware of the change within him, as if Jon had grown five year older after crossing the wall. 

Certainly, he’d been less opposed to helping the people settle after they’d reached the lands. Even as tired as Tormund knew they all were, Jon had helped, worked, and slept in his tent, until his brothers came for him at the end of the first fortnight. He’d been gone too long, they’d said.

“You should let me steal you away if it gets boring,” Tormund had told him in the Old tongue. In lieu of goodbye, Jon had laughed and replied, “I’m afraid then they might never let me back in again.”

Tormund muses on that on his way back to his room. He’d have rather stayed with his people, but it was his weekly time for a bath, and that was much easier to do within enclosed walls where he doesn’t have to worry about his pecker falling off. Not to mention that the southerners had scented soap. Tormund is the first to admit to liking the hot springs and maintaining proper mouth hygiene. But scented soap is something in which he  _ indulges _ . 

Drawing up a bath in Castle Black is an arduous process but once he’s finished rubbing the dirt off his skin and washing dried blood from his hair and beard, he feels better for having returned. The warm water saps away his strength and he’s left drowsy, staring at his knee. Jon had shot him just above it, otherwise the bone there would have shattered, and Tormund would have become lame. 

On their sea journey, somewhere between dawn and dusk, where Jon had looked sapped and grieving, and Tormund had insisted on maintaining his company if for nothing else, to share in the burden of their failure, Jon had apologised. Tormund remembers the attack well; it had been one of the rare times he’d been truly angry. He’d been livid with Jon.

That night, the anger never came. How much could he beat a defeated man? It had taken Jon a few days to get his head right, and since then he’s been working on helping them. Tormund has nothing to forgive anymore. 

It’s simple to admit he is fond of Jon. Perhaps, too much. In his defense, he _ is _ pretty. Before he knew about him and Ygritte, he had made his intentions known, so it isn’t something new. After all, he’s always favored men. 

After washing up, Tormund puts another log into the hearth for extra heat and washes his clothes. The furs always need a little tending, especially after a fight, and he finds holes that need a few stitches. By the time he’s done and his britches are dry enough that he can slip inside, it’s already dark out.

The knock on the doors is not expected but it is welcome. There is only one person in the castle who might want to come to him at such an hour. When he pushes the doors open to see Jon, he’s proved right. 

For a moment, Jon looks at his bare chest before drawing his gaze up. He’s holding a tray with a few covered bowls. He blinks once, twice, and something in his expression changes. “Dinner,” he says. 

Tormund shrugs and opens the doors so he can pass. 

Before Jon can come in, Tormund freezes. His heart lurches. He can hear how quickly it’s beating in his ears. How a direwolf could  _ sneak _ into a castle he isn’t sure, but he sees it now, slowly trodding towards them. Without thinking he grabs Jon by the lapels that hold his heavy cloak on his shoulders, drags him in, and slams the doors behind them. Jon’s frowning, but his gaze jumps from Tormund’s face to his chest then back to his face. 

“I wouldn’t want to alarm you,” Tormund says, ignoring the connotations of Jon’s gaze, “but there’s a fucking direwolf in your castle.”

Jon lets out a little, “Oh.” He nods, growing serious, and places a hand on Tormund’s that’s still holding him by the lapels. He straightens once Tormund lets him go and sets the food down onto the table by the far wall.

Promptly, he walks over to the doors and yanks them open. If nothing kills him, Tormund thinks in that moment, than heart failure caused by Jon fucking Snow will. 

If Jon dies he’ll be the one that has to answer how a  _ direwolf _ maimed him. If he dies, who the fuck will take up his mantle? Tormund feels palpitations in his chest. The fucking direwolf is standing  _ right _ outside. Jon looks down at it, and the wolf opens it’s jaw. He kneels down. 

“Jon!” Tormund hisses. “Don’t be an idiot. Come back into the room.”   
  


Jon doesn’t even look at him. All Tormund can see are his shoulders shaking. Then the wolf steps close, puts a paw on his shoulder, and licks him. Tormund blinks. The wolf nuzzles into Jon’s neck, rubs itself all over his hair, and sits back. 

When Jon looks at him he has a rare smile on his face. Tormund doesn’t get to saviour it because in the next moment Jon starts laughing. The direwolf cocks it’s head, then opens it’s jaw so it appears as if it too is laughing at him. 

“He’s my-- he’s mine,” Jon says through his laughter.

Releaf floods Tormund, and he huffs out a quick curse.

The direwolf passes Jon and Tormund, and strolls inside his room before flopping down by the hearth. Begrudgingly, Tormund helps Jon off the floor and into the room. Thankfully, the heat hadn’t been sapped from it.

“Yes, yes, I bet it’s funny, laugh it up,” Tormund says to Jon despite the fact that it’s a pleasant sound. He’s never heard Jon laughing like this before. Not with this much vigor. 

Jon settles into the chair next to the hearth while Tormund puts on an undershirt. 

“Sorry, I am---” he says, clearing his throat, “I do apologise. It’s just. Well, I’ve gotten used to everyone knowing Ghost.”

“I can’t believe a fucker like you has a direwolf for a pet,” Tormund retorts, sitting on the bed. 

“Well, I wouldn’t call him a pet,” Jon says with a smile. “He’s far too smart for that.”

The direwolf opens it’s jaws and yawns. It’s head is twice the size of Tormund’s. He’s tall enough for children to  _ ride _ . 

“How?” 

“When I was still in Winterfell, I went hunting with father. We found a litter of direwolf puppies. The mother was dead.” Jon reaches down to pat the wolf on his flank. “I convinced father to keep them. Each of the children got one.”

“How many is that?”

“I had two sisters and three brothers,” Jon says his expression softening and saddening. Tormund’s impressed. Whoever can birth that many children must have been one mountain of a woman. 

“My brother and his men were murdered on his wedding. The two youngest ones were burned when Winterfell, our home, was taken and...last I know my sisters were in King’s Landing.” 

At this point Tormund doesn’t even have to ask. Jon adds, “It’s where the king lives.”

“So...that’s safe?”

“The king beheaded my father. He forced one of my sister to marry his imp uncle. They say she poisoned him.”

Not as impressive, Tormund thinks, as going at it with a sword, but he knows the southerners do things differently. She  _ did _ kill a king. But so did Jon. “I’m starting to think your family just likes being king-killers.”

Before, Jon would have taken offence, but now he only makes a face, before saying, “It doesn’t  _ sound  _ like her.”

“People change, Jon. You’re not the same brat when we first met. Now, want something to drink?”

Jon, as usual, shakes his head. He says, quietly, “I didn’t think you would actually use this room. I’m glad.”

Tormund grunts. “What, you went to the camp and you saw I wasn’t there?”

In a rare show, Jon pinks. “Yes actually.” 

“It’s useful.” He clears his throat then says, “Uh so. Can I pet...him?”

Jon’s eyebrows rise. “Ghost?” He looks down at the direwolf who gives him a look back. 

“Well,” Jon says, “If you lose your fingers, you have bragging rights.”   
  


Tormund brightens at the idea. Nothing worth doing is ever easy. And yet, as he’s crouching by the hearth, slowly touch the snow-white fur of a direwolf, he thinks he really wouldn’t mind losing those fingers. 

“You’re beautiful,” he tells the wolf. He means it. 

Tormund becomes aware of Jon’s gaze on him, which lingers. He looks up and catches Jon’s eyes which have left behind sadness, and are now just pools of black, two mountain lakes, filled with heat. It washes over Tormund, and draws him in. The eyes are telling. They tell him that now, Jon sees something he covets. 

Slowly, Jon leans forward. Tormund, on the other hand, stands. Jon is right there, and it’s easy to place a hand on the back of the chair and lean over him.

Jon takes an audible breath, and looks up. 

The silence is deafening. Tormund lifts one of his hands and touches Jon’s shoulder, his neck, up to his cheek. He didn’t expect this. “ _ Vranjska _ .” 

But neither has Jon. For a moment, he is perfectly still, and in the other, he’s placing his own hand over Tormund’s and lowering it, with a soft little, somehow scolding, “Tormund.”

“Did I misunderstand?” Tormund asks. 

Jon takes a breath. “I came here to...ask about our friends. Not for...this.”

“So why can’t it be both?” Tormund asks. 

He likes challenging Jon, just because the man always comes back with an interesting answer. Now, he watches as the question registers in Jon’s mind, he watches his forehead crease and he watches as realization washes over it. 

“You’re not taking this at all seriously are you?” he says, sounding as offended as he is relieved. 

“What’s there to be serious about? Fucking is fucking,” Tormund replies. “It’s you southerners that are weird about it.”

“Aye,” Jon says, mouth lifting up in the corner. “We are.”

He stands and grabs a handful of Tormund’s beard. “So, he says,” looking more at Tormund’s mouth than in his eyes, “don’t make me regret it.”

“There you go,” Tormund smirks. 

He can taste the returning smile on Jon’s lips when they kiss. 

The first few kisses are hard and insistent, as if Jon cannot withhold his desire anymore. Tormund enjoys the softness of Jon’s lips offset by the scratch of his beard all the same. It feels good to know he’s wanted. 

Jon’s hands are restless, going up to his cheeks, than down to his chest, before settling on his shoulders. Tormund drags him in by the hip until they’re belly to belly, and Jon groans into the kiss. 

They break only for air, and only when it gets too hot in the room. Jon starts stripping off his clothes, the heavy cloak landing on the floor with a muffled sound. His outer layers follow, with Tormund’s help, until Jon’s standing in his undershirt and britches.

Tormund can barely keeps his hands to himself to allow him to move. From there it’s easy to slip his hands under the hem of the tunic and feel all the warm smooth skin hiding behind. Jon pulls it over his head as quickly as he can, almost elbowing Tormund in the face, but then he’s kissing him again.

Jon’s hands slide down to the laces holding his britches together, fingers quick to undo them. They’d had some practice while staying with Tormund. He steps back, towards the bed, taking Tormund with him until his legs hit the edge.

Tormund pulls away so he can shuck off his undershirt. It’s amusing to see how Jon halts, for a single moment just looking at him, before his hands trace up from his belly to his chest. Jon never says anything with words, but these moments are enough to tell Tormund what he likes, what he enjoys. Right now, he enjoys unabashedly groping Tormund. And Tormund cannot lie; he likes the attention. 

Humor must be obvious in his voice when he asks, “You got any oil?” 

Jon looks at him, frowning. Probably trying to determine what exactly is so funny to Tormund. He settles on shaking his head. “Like I said I wasn’t really expecting this.”

“Liar,” Tormund accuses, and laughs when Jon’s frown creases his forehead. He kisses it because he can, and because he knows Jon enjoys affection as much as any man given it freely. “I’m joking, Jon.”

“I know,” Jon replies, and sits down on the bed while Tormund goes to the table where, amongst beard knife and hair clippers, he’d left the skin poultice. It will do the work. It  _ has _ been doing the work fine so far, though Tormund had wanted to try oil and see what’s better. Next time. 

He tosses it onto the bed but when he nods for Jon to climb on, he shakes his head. Tormund’s in front of him in a moment, pushing the hair from his face. Sitting, Jon’s just the right height to line up with Tormund’s hips and it’s difficult not to think about what his lips could do for him were he interested.

“I want to try something,” Jon says, not uncertain but careful. He sits forward, hands going to the back of Tormund’s thighs.  _ Oh _ . It seems Jon has the same idea.

“Get to it then,” Tormund replies. Jon looks disgruntled for a moment, before he chuckles. His shoulders relax and he mutters, “Should have known.” 

“What, I wasn’t going to talk you  _ out _ of it,” Tormund says as Jon mouth against his hip and traces his hands up until they can pull down his britches until they’re stuck around his thighs. 

There’s nothing like the feeling of anticipation, and with Jon it doubles. He’s thought about this more times than he cares to think, but when Jon takes his cock in his hand and looks up, Tormund admits his imagination has failed to deliver on the picture. Jon’s eyes are dark, and his mouth is pink, so pink, as it mouth over his heated skin. Tormund’s hard in his hand, and he thinks he could come just from this, just looking at Jon’s face, thinking about spilling all over it. Messing him up, rubbing it in, then licking it all away. 

“Want me to talk you through it?” Tormund offers. His voice is far shakier than he’d expected. 

Jon licks over his side, then starts jerking him off slowly as he mouths over the tip. He keeps moving his hand when he lets Tormund past the seal of his lips. His tongue is warm where it presses against his underside. Tormund groans, gripping Jon’s hair. 

“I’m taking that as a no--” Tormund hisses as Jon takes more of him in. He can’t really swallow down all of his cock, but it doesn’t matter. His hand works with his mouth, so when he bobs his head, Tormund can feel it sliding down. 

Tormund curses and sends silent thanks to Ygritte who must have been the sole reason for Jon’s knowledge. Jon, at first tentative, speeds up until Tormund has to control himself not to thrust into his mouth. Especially because he can see how Jon’s other hand is in his own britches.

“Jon,” Tormund groans. Shit, that’s good. He pulls Jon’s hair, and the man look up at him through his lashes. His eyes are determined. Tormund feels enveloped by them, ensnared to the heat within, and to the promise they hold: that Jon wants this, that he needs it, that he trusts Tormund enough to do this with him. 

He thinks Jon just might want to ruin him, especially when he slowly pulls off his cock. His mouth is red and Tormund can’t stop from running over it with his thumb. 

Jon’s eyes crease, laughing at him. Tormund grins, pushing down and stepping out of his britches. “Get on the damn bed.”

Jon laughs softly when he finally crawls on it, wiggling out of the remained of his clothes. He lets Tormund crawl over him and press him into the blankets before he pulls him down to kiss. 

“I want you to fuck me,” Jon says between breaths, somehow sounding raw, as if it was Tormund with his mouth on Jon’s cock instead of the other way around. 

_ Fuck _ , Tormund thinks even as he kisses Jon again. “You certain?” 

“I’m not...I never did this before.”

“That isn’t exactly news,” Tormund replies. He takes a hold of his curly hair and tugs. Jon inhales sharply then gives him a warning look. 

“It’s easy enough: you like something, you say. You don’t like something, you say. Have to make this good for both of us.”

“Oh that’s...” Jon falls silent, tension bleeding out of his body. It’s telling. 

“What you thought I was just going to bend you over?” Tormund says, laughing. Jon’s warm and Tormund can’t stop rubbing his flank, as if he were a frightened animal. “Fucking isn’t just about sticking it up the ass.”

To Tormund’s satisfaction, Jon says, “I’m sure. But if you do something I don’t like I  _ will _ kick you.”

Delighted, Tormund laughs. “That’s the spirit.”

He kisses Jon again, his neck, chest, then sits back on his haunches. Jon’s legs fall open around him and it’s obvious what Jon think about that when his cock jerks. Grinning, Tormund takes the chance to warm the poultice in his hands while kissing and scratching down Jon’s thigh. 

“I’m going to put my fingers in you first, get you used to the feeling of having something stretching you,” Tormund tells him. 

Jon nods and settles down with a hand under his head, so he can look at what Tormund’s doing, and takes a deep breath. Nerves. Tormund’s forgotten how first times can feels like. In camp, he’d very enthusiastically climbed atop Jon’s lap and ridden him but Tormund also has a decade on Jon and more than a handful of bed partners. 

Jon accepts the first of Tormund’s fingers with the gravity of someone sentenced to gutting. It would be funny, were he not concerned. He tries to ease Jon’s nervousness by running his hands and mouth over his thighs, and indulging in following the groves of his hips. Tormund has a particular weakness for them. He’s strapped in for the long-haul, so it does surprise him when Jon calms quicker than he’d expected. It allows him to put in another finger, push in the slick and work it into Jon’s walls. 

He watches for a reaction, but the man just lets out a breathy sigh or two, and nods at Tormund. Way too serious for something Tormund considers should be fun. 

“I’m not going to hurt you,” Tormund says, squeezing Jon’s thigh as he thrusts in his two fingers within him. 

Jon shifts his ships, glaring at Tormund from under his nose. “I know that.” He lets out a soft grunt, then adds, “But you have a very large cock.”

“I think that’s the nicest thing you’ve said to me,” Tormund replies, stretching Jon with his two fingers. He shudders and when Tormund thrusts them back in, Jon lets out a soft groan. Each time it get a bit easier. 

Jon must start feeling good, because his flagging erection starts twitching atop his belly. He laughs breathily, but it’s broken by a gasp. “Oh- that’s---” He groans, and his hips twitch down. Tormund humms, and continues rubbing the same spot until he sees pleasure seep into Jon’s expression, mouth falling open to release a litany of soft  _ ‘oh, oh, oh’ _ sounds that pour over Tormund and go straight to his cock. 

Tormund enjoys watching him as much as he enjoys bringing Jon pleasure. But he knows, he can do more. Tormund pulls his fingers out only long enough to lie down between Jon’s legs. Jon pants, lifting himself up on one elbow to see what Tormund’s doing but Tormund only glances up at him before he takes more slick into his hand. He screws the two fingers into Jon again, and takes him into his mouth. 

Jon curses and falls back onto the bed. His thighs twitch around him, but they remain obediently open, allowing Tormund to continue sucking his cock. It’s a very  _ pretty _ cock, Tormund thinks absently as he adds another finger into Jon, and Jon groans saying, “Fuck, fuck Tormund, yes--”

His fingers card through Tormund’s hair, uncertain whether to push or pull. The sounds increase the longer Tormund fucks him on his fingers, until Jon realises it and then he’s muffling them with his own hand.

Tormund sucks Jon and swallows around him, feeling his thighs begin to tremble. That’s the sign Tormund has been waiting for. He pulls his fingers out and lifts himself up. Jon’s eyes fly open, hand curling around Tormund’s ear. 

“How do you want it,  _ vranjska _ ?” He kisses up Jon’s chest. “It  _ will _ be easier if you’re on your belly.”

Jon looks at him with glazed eyes. He blinks once, twice, then nods and flips over. He takes a couple of breaths then says, “What does that even mean?”

Tormund takes the chance to kiss the back of his neck before he sits back onto his haunches. “Thought you would figure it out by now.”

He takes Jon’s hips and lifts them up. His spine dips exposing him beautifully. 

Jon tries to glare at him from over his shoulder. “You’re making fun of me.”

Tormund chuckles and slicks himself up. “You’re one of a few bastards still alive I actually respect. Now, deep breaths.”

Sliding into Jon is a practice in patience and once he’s done they’re both breathing as if they’ve been seal hunting. Jon is tight and hot around him, and it takes all control within Tormund not to start slamming his hips into him. Instead he moves gradually, working up towards it.

Jon takes it, groaning ever so often, until Tormund works up a tempo that fits them both. The view, Tormund has to admit, is very good. Jon has strong shoulders and a slim waist and has an ass Tormund can’t help from grabbing. 

When Jon actually moans, it surprises both of them. Still, it tells Tormund he has the angle just as Jon does, after he catches his breath. Tormund speeds his hips up, slamming into the spot that makes Jon tighten around him.

He says, “I can’t believe you feel even bigger inside me.”

Tormund laughs, driving his hips in, feeling the fire in his belly turn molten pleasure. He reaches around Jon’s hip to grab his cock. “That’s two. Should I start the count?”

Jon twitches in his palm and muffles a curse into the blankets underneath them. He’s leaking all over Tormund’s fist but that’s alright. That’s good. “I’m close-  _ fuck _ Tormund, I--”

His pretty little hole twitches around him, and then it squeezes. Jon trembles as he releases into Tormund’s hand, fingers digging into the blankets. His body crumples on itself a wounded little noise rising from Jon’s throat.

Tormund makes sure to fuck him through it and when his own pleasure overwhelms him, he makes sure to pull out and strip his cock until he comes all over Jon’s lower back. 

For a moment he tries to catch his breath, bent over Jon’s back with his forehead resting against his shoulder blades. But before he can flop down, he wills himself to stand up even though his legs don’t wish to comply. He closes the poultice, returns it to the table, passing Jon’s beast which has fallen asleep by the hearth as he picks up Jon’s clothes to lay them over the armchair, and takes the washcloth to clean himself and Jon up. 

The first time he’d gone about it Jon had been surprised. Now he lays still, basking in the feeling of completion sex always brings them.

Once he’s finished, Tormund washes his mouth out, takes Jon’s cloak and covers them both with it. They’ll be cold soon, but they’ve fucked over the blankets, and he doesn’t see them moving any time soon.

Eventually, Jon says, “I should leave.”

He doesn’t appear to be moving at all, except when he’d flopped down, to melt into the blankets. Now, he pushes himself up only to catch Tormund’s gaze. He looks disheveled like he’d gone a few rounds in the sparring pit. Tormund likes the look. 

He allows Tormund to brush away the hair from his face. Absently, Tormund remembers he’s always liked curly hair. 

With the statement left ignored by both of them, Jon adds, “I realize now...why you like it.”

For a moment Tormund thinks he’s talking about hair, then realizes it’s about sex. Jon rises up and leans forward to kiss him. 

“Give it a few more tries,” Tormund says, biting his lip. “I will make your legs give out.”

He sees the shiver go down Jon’s spine. He kisses Tormund again, hands wrapped around his shoulders. “Next time,” Jon says, “you should fuck my mouth.”

Tormund grins. “Do you  _ want _ to sleep tonight or do you want to fuck again?”

“I  _ need _ to leave,” Jon replies, not bothering to conceal his disappointment. 

Still, he stays long enough to kiss Tormund more, until their bodies grow cold and the candles are flickering. When he gets up, Tormund finally slips underneath the blankets, and lays onto his belly, observing as Jon dresses. 

He skin is pretty and pink between his thighs, he notes smugly.

“Feed the fire for me before you leave,” Tormund says, already half-asleep. 

Jon does, then clicks his tongue. Ghost climbs to his feet and leaves alongside Jon. The room is far too quiet and far too large. Tormund turns towards the wall. 

####  \- 

Tormund is not used to sitting in one place for too long. With his people, there’s always something to be done, someone to help or to mediate between the Crows who have become worse than ever. Jon is busy and Tormund cannot rely just on him. His people didn’t pick him just because he knew to swing an axe.

He isn’t used to avoidance either. In fact, it takes Tormund a bit of time to catch on. Jon talks with him, when he can, about resources and about Stannis’ troops which leave and, losing a battle more against the snow than the people they were fighting, never come back. All that is left are a two strange faces: a man they like to call the onion knight, Davos Seaworth, and a Red Witch, Melisandre.

He was never fond of witchcraft. There are rules to their world, and those rules get bent, sometimes broken, by those that like to talk with fires and demons and other dark things that creep in the night. Tormund’s opinion is that, if you can’t save yourself, no gods are going to help you. If they’re anything like people, they’re cruel and fickle things, picking and choosing a handful they like while ignoring the rest. 

Like, for instance, Jon. He doesn’t know why the man just doesn’t stab him somewhere soft and tell him to fuck off. There’s too much dancing about these things with southerners. Had Jon stayed longer with them, he’d have learned to be blunt; Free Folk have more to worry about than regretting where their cock leads them. 

Tormund would let it be if he knew where he stood now. He needs to clear the air. So what he does is come to Jon in one way that doesn’t spook him: he knocks on the doors of the room Jon calls ‘the office’ where he does his Lord Commander business. 

Once Jon sounds off, he walks in, sits in the chair across from him and says, “We need to talk.”

Jon’s drawn himself up, trying to take up more space, to make himself appear bigger. Yet, even though he’s obviously uncomfortable, says, “Did something happen with the brothers again?”

“You can say that,” Tormund replies. He waits, but all Jon does is motion with his hand and say, “And?”

“And he’s been playing a fool and avoiding me,” Tormund says. Immediately, Jon tries to deflect but Tormund cuts through and says, “I would like to think both of us are smart. Maybe not civilized, but smart. I came here to ask your issue.”

After all, he had thought Jon and he had started something. Something good, perhaps too young to name, but still good. 

Jon’s jaw works, his hands curled into fists. He isn’t looking at Tormund. 

“What are you so scared of?” Tormund asks him. 

“What I’ve learned, living in Winterfell, is that all walls have ears,” Jon says slowly, rising his eyes to meet Tormund’s. He doesn’t look nervous anymore. He looks defeated. “The brothers would not take kindly to this.” He gestures with his hand between them.

“You care what they think of you.” Tormund hadn’t thought Jon was the person who cared about the opinion of others. After all, he’d been the one to bring them over the Wall. That must not have been popular with the Crows either. 

“They might think I’m not fit to be Lord Commander,” Jon says. “And the next one definitely wouldn’t share my opinion when it comes to your people.”

“Your nest hasn’t seen hatching in awhile, Jon,” Tormund says. 

“No,” Jon agrees. “But should that happen, then the Warden of the North would be duty-bound to attack you. The Night’s Watch may be strong in name only, but sometimes that’s enough. Trust me, you don’t want to fight the Boltons.”

Now, Tormund understands. Jon has been thinking about the people first. 

Tormund leans into the backrest. “So we’ll be careful.”

“Tormund,” Jon says, exasperated. “You can’t tell me that’s you’d like that.”

“It’s important to you.”

For a moment, he sees Jon’s mouth working, as if he wants to say something, but words fail him.

“We saw what’s coming. Before any southern army could come up here to kill us, we’d be dead already.”

“You can’t know that,” Jon says, shaking his head. 

“No, but I know the distance between Hardhome and Castle Black. Besides,” he says, looking around at the gloomy office. “You can’t tell me secrecy is all you want for the rest of  _ your  _ life.”

Not that they have much time left. Tormund knows that Jon knows that as well. Jon’s eyes soften, and where once he’d sat frozen, now he thaws. 

“It isn’t,” he admits. He rubs his eyebrow, sighs. “I don’t think I will have much choice.”

“Of course you have choice,” Tormund says. “My people don’t care. And they won’t sit still in the south. If there’s a north to return to, after the war’s won, they’ll go back.”

He watches the realization dawn on Jon’s face, and he watches his face crack, his eyes filling with something which Tormund had not seen before. Hope. Tormund knows what he’s offering. He holds Jon’s gaze. There are no tricks here. What he says he means.

Slowly, Jon nods. “Until the war’s won then.”

“Until the war’s won,” Tormund agrees. 

After a moment, Jon smiles, letting out a little helpless laugh Tormund mirrors. They might die long before the war comes, but it’s almost certain that they’ll die when it comes through their gates. They’ll fight, but death is difficult to beat. Still, such a promise eases the fear in him. Even the night falls, giving way to dawn. 

####  -

The arrangement works like this: twice a month Tormund comes to Castle Black, and once Jon rides out to visit Tormund in the settlement. The Crows think Tormund is bringing information and when Jon goes, he tells them he’s doing so to check its validity. 

Deception and lies never sat well with Tormund, but it’s not as if he’s being dishonest about everything. He does bring information, but it’s only because Jon’s interested in how the people are doing, how his daughters are, and the rest, so when he comes visit, he knows where to pick up conversation. 

They’ve gotten used to seeing a rider in black coming towards them now, and once Jon’s free of the horse and sitting with them, the first wariness passes. He’s grown on them, Tormund thinks, like a particularly stubborn moss. 

A night and a morning is all Tormund gets. A night which they spend in talk, drink and sex, and a morning which goes too soon, passed in stealing moments, and saying goodbye. The longer it goes on, the harder it is to leave. The happier Tormund is to see Jon. 

He’s in his tent when Drys runs in, face shrouded by large dark curls. She brushes the hair from her eyes, annoyed, and says, “ _ Papa, there’s a Crow rider coming closer. _ ”

At once Tormund stands. Jon’s early. Tormund had only left Castle Black a few days prior. But he isn’t going to complain that he’s given a chance to see him again so soon. 

He picks Drys up who yelps and kicks out with her elbows and knees. “ _ Let me down! I want to go see Jon first! _ ”

She’d not had the chance to meet him yet, and had been jealous of her older sister who had. Ever since she’d been pestering him about it. Tormund laughs and lets her jump out of his arms. She catches herself on her feet, then turns and runs out. In the distance he can see the grey mare Jon sometimes uses, but as it gets closer he sees the rider is not Jon. It’s Edd.

Tormund frowns and reaches the man just to hear his daughter saying, “I thought you’d be prettier.”

She looks as offended as Edd does at the statement. But where one would have laughed, Edd only nods, eyes going past her to the others until they spot him. Recognition sparks and he appears to steel himself. Yet, somehow, he looks pacified. It’s never a good thing when a Crow sees you and sighs in relief. 

“Something’s wrong,” Tormund says. He can see it in the way Edd holds himself. 

“The bastards took Castle Black.” The grief on his face comes into full view, just before he says, “They killed him, Tormund. They killed Jon.”

####  -

The stillness in Jon’s body tells Tormund all he needs to know before he can get a closer look at his wounds. All the color has bled from his skin, and all the light has fled his eyes. It’s not Jon anymore. His soul has already left his body. It has been gone for three days and three nights, but looking at Jon again like this, doesn’t make it any easier to bear.

Death is something known to Tormund. He’s lived with it his whole life. There is no fear when he faces it, not even regret if he’s dying fighting. 

Jon had not fought back. 

“Took a lot of knives,” he says, trying to will his fingers from touching the wounds. 

It would have been easier had they been across the Wall. He could have buried Jon under a red-leafed tree or, considering the dead marching towards them, burned him. There are no weirwoods here anymore and Tormund doesn’t think he could live, letting Jon become a servant of the Night King. 

Jon’s beast nudges Tormund’s hand with its snout, licking his fingers. Tormund feels just as lost. What will they do now? They’ve taken the castle, true, but Tormund and his people, did not agree to bow to the rule of whoever is the lord of Castle Black. They’d agreed to fight with Jon.

Jon had promised him he’d live out until the long night comes. Somehow, Tormund had believed that to be true. He would have been better off staying with them. Tormund should have stolen him when he had the chance. 

“I’ll go tell the men to prepare wood. Bodies to burn.” He looks at Jon once more, then turns. How many good men will die because of stupidity of others? 

Ghost follows him out of the room and stays with him. As it’s namesake, the direwolf doesn’t whine and barely makes a sound even as it settles near Tormund to look at him. He supposes the wolf got used to him. Tormund wonders if now he should release him into the wild. With Jon gone, there’s little purpose in staying. For both of them.

“There may be a way,” Davos Seaworth tells him that night. 

Witchcraft is never the way. When herbs fail, when Gods leave you, it’s always witchcraft that scoops out the rest of the man, leaving nothing behind for the alive. But Tormund listens and helps. It’s what he owes Jon. To at least try. 

There’s little Tormund regrets but now he regrets not being with him when the bastards took him. He regrets having promises broken.

Witchcraft is not the way but Tormund still hopes it works. 

Before he can let it happen, even with Jon’s body prepared for it, he needs to say his goodbyes. The Red Witch is looking at him, just like Davos and Edd. He’d told Jon that there are no funeral words. The dead can’t hear. But the living can. 

In the end, he can’t force the words out of his mouth. Even in death Jon looks beautiful and in pain. He sighs and turns to take a seat. He is also the first to leave, when the magics don’t work. He should have known.

Tormund’s looking towards the steel grey sky above the castle, when the Red Witch walks out. She looks at him and Tormund can see she is sorry. 

“The gods don’t always listen,” she says.

“Fuck the gods,” Tormund says and turns back towards the courtyard. “The gods didn’t bring us from Hardhome. Jon did.”

He sees her green eyes widening but she nods. Both of them are in the corridor when they hear the noise. The Witch is in front of him and runs first, but he’s quick behind her. When he runs back to the room, Davos has his hands around Jon, holding him up. His chest is moving. When he lifts his head, he looks at Tormund, and his eyes aren’t blue. 


	3. Jon

Twelve feet separate the doors from the cold wooden chair at the foot of Lord Commander’s table. One needs only a few moments to cross those twelve feet, and that time is all Jon has before Tormund barrels into him. Yet, when his arms wrap around Jon, they’re far more gentle than Jon anticipates. 

His furs are soft where they press against Jon. He hides his face into them long enough to feel Tormund’s warmth seeping into his skin. The strong hands around him squeeze, and there’s a soft, shuddering breath above him. 

_ “Vranjska _ ,” Tormund says, and it sounds like a curse said in relief. 

Jon doesn’t try to think. He can’t. Not with so many sensations around him. He grips Tormund weakly, his strength having fled him, or perhaps, having not yet returned. 

He doesn’t know how much time passes. All he can feel are breaths against his temple, and then someone clearing their throat. Davos. Jon forgot about him. When the doors banged open, his eyes instinctively went to search out the cause of the noise, skipped over the Red Witch and stuck to Tormund, whom Jon thought he would never see again. 

Selfishly, he doesn’t want to push Tormund away. He feels too breakable, too weak, too heartbroken for anyone other than him to witness. Tormund’s warm in every way that matters. Seeing him, feeling him, being held by him, is a comfort. That’s how Jon knows he’s alive.  _ Truly  _ alive. 

“ _ Time to let go _ ,” Jon murmurs softly but Tormund has always had good hearing. 

“ _ Fuck _ ,” Tormund curses with feeling. “ _ You’re so stupid. Who lets themselves get killed?”  _

Despite himself, Jon laughs. It turns into a wheezing cough. His lungs don’t seem to be working properly.

Tormund lingers only a moment longer before he pulls away and helps Jon sit down on the cold wooden chair. With Tormund goes the heat. Sooner than Jon had wished he is once again cold down to his toes, as if he’d never really been warm in the first place. Something isn’t quite right with him, but Jon can’t put a finger on what it is. 

He looks at Davos and the Red Witch who in turn look at Tormund, as if  _ he _ is the one not fitting in the picture. Tormund hovers, just in reach, as if he can’t force himself to pretend he is even-hearted. Because, Jon realizes quite belatedly, he isn’t. He  _ cares _ .

Jon tries to take a deep breath but his chest hurts. The wounds are still open, still painful and ugly on his grey skin. He died, Jon thinks barely able to comprehend it. He was dead. He shouldn’t be here. 

“Would you mind finding me some clothes?” he asks Tormund. 

The man frowns, not looking too pleased about it, then huffs. “ _ If you die before I get back, I will tell the witch to bring you back again just to kill you myself _ .” Then he turns and leaves. 

Davos looks concerned and it doesn’t really cease once they begin to talk. The expression grows when Tormund finally returns carrying a hefty bundle, followed by Ghost. 

Once the wolf sees him, Ghost comes to him and Jon feels himself breaking. He died and there was nothing. He didn’t see his father or his grandfather, he didn’t see Robb or even Catelyn Stark, who had bowed to the Seven. 

He hugs Ghost as long as he can, before Tormund prompts him to get up. “Unless you want frostbite.”

Jon’s legs barely hold him. Somehow, Tormund helping him dress should have felt mortifying, but it’s not. There’s comfort in his strong hands, and the way they brush over his skin, rousing heat within him. It’s a strange sensation. 

Jon is far too aware of Davos still being present in the room. Were he not, Jon would have done something impulsive and necessary, like kiss Tormund. He wants to, especially when Tormund bends so Jon can see his heavy stormy brow.

Once dressed, Jon doesn’t feel any warmer than he was before. The cold inside him doesn’t feel like the usual chill he’d gotten used to so long ago. More than that, it feels like he has a shard of ice stuck in his chest, numbing him to everything but the pain from his wounds and the heat of familiar flesh. 

He looks at Tormund and remembers he had a promise to keep: to be there for the Long Night. But rather than looking cross, Tormund’s eyes are soft and proud, and they ask for nothing else than to keep looking at him.

####  -

“They think you’re a god,” Tormund tells him as he helps Jon down the stairs to go face his brothers and the Free Folk. Jon doesn’t feel like a god. Instead, he feels as if his skin is too tight around him, ill-fitting, old. Even dragons shed their skin, he muses, but he forgets to question the thought when Edd hugs him, desperately relieved.

####  -

There’s a certain type of carelessness guiding John’s hand when pulls Tormund into a kiss the moment they’re behind closed doors of his room. Jon tells himself that he had died and come back to him; he’s allowed a little tenderness. 

If he had the strength he would have pushed Tormund into the doors, been as rough and reckless as he was the first time round. But his feet are still weak underneath him and it takes an effort to do anything more than walk. 

It’s Tormund who bends his head in an offering and who takes his cheeks between his hands and kisses him. Death has given him a new perspective. In their world, there is little time for doubt and fear. 

He doesn’t know who shudders, only that Tormund’s kisses are soft and sweet, and grow quicker, more desperate until they’re both clutching at each other again. Jon feels bruised all over, but nowhere as much as in his heart, which is miraculously beating in his chest, invigorated with this new life. 

Jon clings to him, amazed that he can feel the warmth of his skin, the roughness of his beard, the strength of his arms, and he’s grateful beyond measure that he gets to keep it. At least for another lifetime. Until the Long Night comes. 

Tormund grips him tightly, but even with all his wounds, Jon does not wish to pull away. In turn, Tormund doesn’t seem to want to let him go either, now that there are no more questioning eyes pointed at them. The sentiment isn’t lost on him. 

There’s a lingering feeling in his mind, telling him how this isn’t supposed to happen, but the voice is no stronger than the whisper of the wind. Jon bundles that feeling of wrongness within his mind and lets it dissolve into nothing. He breathes a little easier then. 

When he pulls away from Tormund to say, “Edd told me you stormed the castle for me. Then he gave me one of his looks.”

Tormund laughs softly, his chest rumbling with it. “Drys may have though you were him.”

Jon chuckles. The hearth in Jon’s room had been lit, but Jon doesn’t really feel the heat of it yet. It’s Tormund that warms him up now, with his hands, his eyes, his smile.

“What will you do now?” Tormund asks him. 

Jon considers Tormund’s furs, but looks up at him when he says, “My brothers killed me. I did what was right and they killed me for it. My watch...it’s over.”

“You’ll need somewhere to go then,” Tormund says, and though it’s teasing, Jon can hear the hope in his voice. “Somewhere south, maybe.”

“Good thing I have some clothes then,” Jon retorts, feeling as happy as he is sad. He’s kept the furs Tormund had gifted him. 

Tormund laughs and kisses him. “South then. And when the time comes, north again.”

Jon nods, hiding a smile into Tormund’s chest. His furs smell like the night they’d walked out of and the wax that drips from the candles that have been lit hours ago. The day Jon has spent with others, but the night has always been Tormund’s.

“Come on, let me look at the bandages,” Tormund says. He’s the one who’d bandaged him and the only one Jon feels comfortable enough looking at the wounds. They’re not as deep as they were at first, as they should be, but they will leave scars nonetheless. 

For some reason, Jon remembers Tormund telling him of blood-letting. He wonders what poison Jon had bled on the foundations of Castle Black, and what will grow within him in its stead.

Jon sits while Tormund re-dresses his bandages, and when they lay to sleep, they lay down together. In the morning, Jon has no intention of getting up before him and pretending. He’s promised silence until the Long Night, but now he has a chance. Maybe it  _ can _ be just that easy. 

Tormund curls around his back, hand thrown over his hip but low enough so as not to hurt Jon. 

“You know,” Jon says, “I always wanted to see Dornish beaches. I’m tired of the cold.”

“Where are these Dornish beaches?” Tormund asks into his shoulder. 

“As down south, as the Wall is north. They say they’re baked golden, and that they’re warm even during winter. South of King’s Landing, there’s never any snow. Will you...” Jon sighs and turns so he can catch Tormund’s eye. “Will you come with me?”

“Will we make it back for the war?” Tormund asks. Jon nods. “Then I’ll go.”

He settles down again, intent on ignoring Jon’s gaze, and Jon turns back around to face the darkening room. He watches the fire crackle in the hearth, eating the logs one after another until there’s little than ash left. In the silence of the midnight, Jon says, “I think I figured out what you mean when you call me  _ vranjska _ .”

Tormund is asleep, but it matters little. He thinks the name is really just this: being together, being warm, being safe. Trust and care. Belief. That is enough.

In the morning Tormund tells him, “It means my little crow.” Jon enjoys the possessiveness of the word. He wants to be Tormund’s and that’s the biggest revelation he’s had that isn’t followed by feelings of shock or dread. All he feels is a swell of tenderness in his chest, yet he’s content when Tormund kisses him. That’s how he knows it’s true. 

####  -

Alistair Throne and all of the brothers of the watch that betrayed him hang, but all that keeps repeating in his mind are his father’s words: the man who passes the sentence should swing the sword.

####  -

There are few good men left in their world and Eddison Tollett is one of them. Jon feels no regret and no fear when he hands him over the Lord Commander cloak. It has served him well. He hopes in the future, however long that is, it will serve Edd well too. 

“Where are you gonna go?” Edd asks. He’s wearing the coat stiffly, as if he can’t quite come to terms with its weight yet. 

“South,” Jon says.

“What are you gonna do?” Edd gives him a pointed look. He knows but Jon appreciates his attempts at subtlety all the same. It is one thing to know something and another to give it a name. But it doesn’t matter anymore. 

Jon smiles, small and private. “Get warm.”

The other man doesn’t look amused. His eyes are hard when he says, “I was with you at Hardhome. We saw what’s out there. We know it’s coming here. How can you leave us now?”

“I did everything I could--”

“You swore a vow,” Edd says, sharp.

It brings Jon to a halt. He takes a sharp breath. If Edd hopes to dissuade him, he’s never even had a starting chance. Jon will do with his second life what he could never do with his first. Find peace. Settle. “Aye, I pledged my life to the Night’s Watch, I gave my life--”

“--for all night’s to come,” Edd finishes for him. 

“They killed me Edd. My own brothers. You want me to stay here after that?” Jon could not, even if he wanted to. He’d thought he was doing what was best for everyone. But it seems he is not a good leader for not turning a blind eye to Tormund’s people. 

If that makes him the worst Lord Commander, then so be it. His pride could never be bigger than the thousands of lives Tormund and he had ferried across the Shivering Ocean on conviction alone.

Edd looks at the bundle of furs. Jon had hoped to get dressed before being cornered, but Edd knows him too well. 

“Whatever it is that brought me back, be it the Lord of Light, or the Old Gods, or the Drowned One, it doesn’t matter. What matters is that I have a chance at life. A real chance. I have fulfilled my duties,” Jon says, patting Edd on the shoulder. 

Edd shakes his head. “You’re not the type to lay down without fighting. Either of you.”

Jon smiles. “We’ll fight, Edd. But until then, there’s still a little time. A small life. Just enough to see something that’s not fucking snow before I die.”

Besides, Tormund’s waiting for him by the stables and Jon doesn’t wish to linger any more than he wants to. Before Edd can say whatever he wishes to, the air is disturbed by the sound of a single horn blowing. Friends. Jon looks at Edd. The Night’s Watch has little of those left. 

He and Edd walk out to the stairs and watch as three people unsaddle their horses. One is a large woman, tall and short haired, dressed like a knight. Another, is a young man. Between them, though a little tousled, he recognizes the red hair even before his sister turns around. 

She looks nothing like the girl he’s seen riding out of Winterfell. He thought her _ dead _ .

Before he can give them orders, his feet lead him down the stairs by themselves. 

She’s a little ragged, tired, cold, but it’s Sansa and when he opens his arms, and she runs into them, he knows it to be true. 

He grips her tightly. What else can he do, when his family has come back from death? 

He catches sight of Tormund across her shoulder and realizes, with a sinking feeling, that he can’t go with him. Tormund seems to read this from his face because he gives Jon a little nod and leads the two horses he had waiting for them back to the stables. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is it folks! Tormund and Jon's story is going to continue in the 2nd installment of the Vranjska series, which I will be posting in a couple of days. It concerns the Battle of the Bastards. Thank you all for your lovely comments it really made posting this amazing <3


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